In the documentarySide by Side, he criticized the ubiquitousness of inexpensive high quality cameras for essentially allowing anyone to become a filmmaker, potentially saturating the media landscape with awful entertainment that the masses wouldn't be able to distinguish from works by conventionally trained persons. This new media landscape is flawed due to lack of a "tastemaker"—similar to how Steve Jobs complained that journalistic editorial content was now sorely lacking, mentioned at one of the Some Things Digital conferences.

Di Bonaventura serves as chair of the Creative Council for Represent.Us, a nonpartisan anti-corruption organization.[5] He has served on the Claremont Graduate University Board of Trustees since 2015.[6]